Byzantine Art vs Western Medieval Art

The relationship of the art of Byzantium with Western Europe has been a topic of scholarly inquiry since the mid-nineteenth century. The early scholarship, written by Western Europeans looking East, has several features in common. Byzantine art is understood to be early in date, different or foreign, and thus primitive. Because Byzantine art is assumed to be unchanging, it could provide important evidence, it was thought, about the origins of Christian art. As the Romantic antiquarian Adolphe..